Upper Class And Middle Class

One of the most known and wide-spread social stratifications of classes in the United Kingdom is the common three stratum model dividing people into upper class, middle class and working class. People are placed within one of these three groups based on different aspects and characteristics such as origin, financial or material wealth, educational attainment, occupation, accent, usage of leisure time, etc.
Upper class is closely associated with aristocracy – people of royal origin and hereditary title. Members of this class possessed stately homes and graduated from universities such as Oxford or Cambridge and high schools such as Eton. As for the job, high positions as a bankowner, a CEO or a politician are considered to be typical for upper

According to Cambridge Dictionary, middle class is described as: “a social group that consists of well-educated people, [...] who have good jobs and are neither very rich nor very poor“ (2015). It can be observed here that main stress is put on jobs as if it being one of the most significant characteristics in placing individuals into classes. In his book British Cultural Identities, Storry realizes the importance of occupations when claims he that the “employment situations“ (Storry, 1997, p. 212) play a huge role when talking about middle class, and portrays four group division of such people providing examples of typical

Sometimes, further subcategories such as upper middle class and lower middle class are provided, but for the purpose of this thesis, there is no need to explain them in more details.
Working class defined by Investopedia stands for: “persons in a social class marked by jobs that provide low pay, require limited skills and/or physical labor, and have reduced education requirements. Unemployed persons or those supported by a social welfare program are often included in this group“ (2015). It is important to mention, however, that some scholars use model of social stratification which includes fourth class called underclass, and homeless people and those living from social welfare benefits are placed into that group.
In conclusion, occupation plays a crucial role in dividing people into classes. In each class described here, employment was one of the most defining characteristics. In fact, included definition of working class here takes into account only the economic point of view – the one dividing people into classes based on how much money they earn and what kind of job they have. Of course, this is not the only defining characteristic and it is important to be aware of other traits too. Those traits are going to be discussed in more detail in the later part of the